Erik Prince Net Worth: Know his income source, military company, career, family, affairs, education

How did Erik make a fortune of $2.4 billion? Let's have a look

Erik Prince is a former American Navy Seal and entrepreneur who has a massive net worth of $2.4 billion. He was the owner and founder of a secretive government organization called Blackwater Worldwide currently known as Academi LLC.
Most of Eric’s fortune came by selling his largest private military company Blackwater. He also made his income as a U.S. Navy officer and his inheritance from Grandfather’s automotive accessory empire.

Know Early life and family business of Eric Prince

Eric Dean Prince was born on 6 June 1969 to the parents Edgar and Elsa in Holland, Michigan. The place has the largest population of Dutch Americans. He is the youngest among the 4 children. His parents were operating a Dutch heritance. Before Eric was born his father along with the other two colleagues founded a company called The Prince Company which was an automobile manufacturing company. The company produced the accessories for the auto parts. With the company’s manufacturing process, it was gaining the massive success within a few years. By the time Eric was 4 years the company had multiple branches and hundreds of employees.
The company was most famous for selling the standard accessory of cars worldwide, sun visor. With a rapid growth in the sales of the product, the company was manufacturing around 20,000 sun visors every day. This is where most of his family’s earnings were made founded by his father.

Education background and career beginning

Erik Prince went to Holland Christian High School and later was accepted into U.S. Naval Academy but he was not interested there so he left the academy after 3 semesters. Then, he began studying economics at Hillsdale College. During his college, he also worked as an intern at the White House with George H.W. Bush. He also volunteered and worked in a local Sheriff Department as a firefighter and a cold water diver. He became an emergency medical technician whilst in college. 

Following his Bachelor’s degree in 1992, he became a NAVY officer and was deployed to the Middle East, Haiti and the Balkans.

Let’s see how Erik started his company?

In 1995, Erik’s father died and his Seal career was on halt. By the time Eric was 25 years old. His mother called upon him to come home and run the Prince Company. A year later, Eric and his mother sold their family business to Johnson Controls Company at a price of $1.3 billion in cash.
After the sale of their company, Eric moved to Virginia Beach and launched a private military company called Blackwater Worldwide in 1997. The company was co-founded with his fellow ex-seal Al Clark. The main objective of the company was to provide security to the United States Federal government. It focused on giving ideal training and restorative facilities to American military and Police personnel. It was for both retired and active candidates. The facility was targeted to provide training against terrorist attacks.

.
Blackwater won the contract for the largest military force in the U.S. The fortune of the company skyrocketed afterward. The company’s contract went to $1 billion by 2007 followed by $2, 00,000 in 2000. The company went on to become one of the largest, most powerful and deadliest private military globally as of today. Since 2001, Blackwater has received more than $600 million worth of classified contracts and $1.6 billion worth of federal contracts from CIA.

What did Eric do after the sale of his successful company?

In 2007, The Company came under the public inspection, observation, and criticisms when its employee killed 17 unarmed Iraqi civilians under a State Department contract. 6 of the contractors involved in the shooting were indicated by the Justice Department in December 2008.
In 2009, the prince left his position as a chairman of the Board and a year later the Blackwater Worldwide was sold to stockholders and group of investors.
After the sale of the company, Eric moved to the United Arab Emirates and became an advisor to the crown prince of Abu Dhabi. During his career, he has worked as a CIA spy and is given a title of “a Fix-It in the war on terror.” By Vanity Fair.

How many times did Eric get married?

Eric Prince was previously married to Joan Nicole in 1991 who introduced Eric to Catholicism. They had 4 children together. Unfortunately, Joan died of cancer at the age of 36 in 2003.
Eric also had an affair with his children’s nanny Joanna Ruth Houck and then they got married in 2004 until 2012. They had 3 children together.
After that, he is with wife Stacy DeLuke a former spokeswoman for Blackwater.